Ultrasound imaging is widely used in medical diagnosis for visualizing internal body structures including tendons, muscles, joints, vessels and internal organs for possible pathology or lesions. Ultrasound imaging is also widely used for examining pregnant women and their babies.
The conventional two-dimensional (2-D) B-mode ultrasound image uses a line scan mechanism with a focusing wave at the transmitter and a time-domain delay-and-sum (DAS) beamforming at the receiver. To an object at a depth of 5-10 cm, due to the line scan mechanism and possible transmit/receive dynamic focusing, the frame rate, in general, can reach to up to 30-60 frames per second.
However, a ‘one-shot’ imaging mechanism with a plane wave transmission and a frequency-domain beamforming at the receiver for computational reason is used in high frame rate (HFR) ultrasound image. In this case, due to the one-shot image mechanism, the frame rate is capable of reaching 3000-6000 frames per second.